Losers on a roll

Winners on various music shows may fade away. But often losers on these shows have made their mark in Bollywood, says Vijay Vedala

Abhijeet Sawant (left) and Prashant Tamang, winners of Indian Idol-1 and 3, respectively, have hardly been heard of after they won the crown.

Even as television channels gear up for an all-new season of music-based reality shows, promising new superstars year after year, the past winners have faded into oblivion, unable to live up to the hype generated by these shows.

According to music director Ehsaan Noorani of the Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy group, all music shows are a battle for TRPs and advertising. "Talent rarely plays a defining role in the end result. The real talent gets eliminated for reasons not related to singing," he says.

"The shows promise creating superstars but instead produce singers, who end up only doing stage shows," Noorani adds.

The winner of first Indian Idol (on Sony TV) Abhijeet Sawant enjoyed his moments of fame with ‘Mohabbatein lutaunga (Aapka Abhijeet Sawant) and ‘Marjawa mitjawa’ (Aashiq Banaya Aapne) but then disappeared from the limelight. His successors Sandeep Acharya and Prashant Tamang fared even worse as they have hardly been heard of ever since winning the crown.

Despite being the second runner up in Indian Idol-1 Rahul Vaidya has already sung in films like Shaadi No. 1, Krazzy 4 and Jaaneman.

Similarly, Debojit Saha and Aneek Dhar (winners of Sa re ga ma pa-Challenge 2005 and 2007, respectively) and Ishmeet Singh (winner of Star Voice of India 2007) hardly found any mention after the shows were over.

Commenting on the trend, music-director Aadesh Shrivastava, who will be seen as a judge in Zee’s Sa re ga ma pa-Challenge 2009 says, "Many eventual winners in these shows are not the best of singers.

Hence they rarely get opportunities in Bollywood. It is the other talented but lesser-known contestants of the show, who have fared better."

Echoing Shrivastava, music director and singer Shankar Mahadevan, who will also tutor students for Sa re ga ma pa challenge this season says, "We are not looking out for a winner in reality shows as the person may not necessarily be the best singer." However, he adds, "Bollywood is always scouting for talent and the show succeeds in throwing up talented people like Nihira Joshi and Raja Hassan."

The observation is not misplaced as the challengers to winner’s crown like Raja Hassan (who lost to Dhar under controversial circumstances), Nihira Joshi (finalist Sa re ga ma pa-Challenge 2005), NC Karunya (runner-up to Sandeep Acharya), Rahul Vaidya (2^nd runner up Indian Idol-1) and Rahul Saxena (made it to top 10 of Indian Idol-1) among others have made noteworthy strides towards Bollywood.

While Hassan is rumoured to have bagged work along side Adnan Sami, Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy, Vishal Shekhar and Bappi Lahiri, Nihira received accolades for her songs in Saalam-e-Ishq.

Meanwhile, Vaidya (Shaadi No. 1, Jigyasa, Hot Money, Krazzy 4 and Jaaneman), Saxena (Om Shanti Om) and Karunya (Lage Raho Munnabhai) look settled to play a long innings in Bollywood.

"The actual struggle for a contestant starts once the show is over. To succeed one requires a lot of willpower and perseverance and only people willing to make the effort succeed," says Jatin Pandit (of Jatin-Lalit fame), who has been a part of Sa re ga ma pa shows as well as Star Voice of India, citing examples of Sunidhi Chauhan and Shreya Ghoshal, themselves products of music shows. — PTI

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